Second Contact

by Mike Resnick

  “He's married, he has five grown kids—the boy and two of the girls are in the service, another girl is a doctor, and the fifth is estranged from her family and hasn't been in contact with them for almost a decade. He doesn't go to church and professes no religion. He is—or maybe was—a master of hand-to-hand combat and holds a couple of sharpshooting records.”

  “He sounds formidable.”

  “The head of Covert Operations is supposed to sound formidable.”

  “Do he and his wife live alone?”

  “I told you—the kids are all grown and gone.”

  “What about servants? Or, in an apartment that size, how about military aides, or even bodyguards?”

  “I can't pull that kind of information from his dossier,” replied Jaimie, after hitting a couple of commands on her keyboard with no results. “I suppose if he has instant access to military personnel it would be here, but the only way to find out if he's got live-in servants is to go there and see.”

  “That could be awkward. Given his position, he's got to have direct contact with Covert Operations’ headquarters. Probably there's a hidden button somewhere in those ten thousand square feet that summons half a hundred armed men, and we're not going to know where it is until someone hits it.”

  “The frustrating thing is that there's no way to stake out his apartment until the servants, if they exist, go out. We can watch hundreds of maids and butlers and cooks step out of the elevator on the ground floor, but we can't know which floor they came from.”

  “Isn't there some light display that tells us where the elevator is at, so we can see what floors it stops at?”

  She shook her head. “I looked for it when we were there, but they don't have it on the residential elevators, only on the ones that go to the business and office floors.”

  “Then it looks like his wife is our best bet,” said Becker. He paused thoughtfully. “Maybe we could kidnap her while she's out shopping, and then offer her back in exchange for some kind of truce.”

  “Too tricky,” answered Jaimie. “Let's say you accost her in the Diamond Tower's lobby, or even at Tiffany's. You've still got to walk her three blocks to our hotel without her yelling for help, or fainting, or running off into a crowd, and you've got to do it without flashing your pistol. Too many things can go wrong. Besides, for all we know, she's got five plainclothes bodyguards trailing her, bodyguards we won't know anything about until they blow us away.” She shook her head again. “Much better to beard the lion in his own den. At least we ought to be able to control the situation there.”

  “She might still be a weak link, though,” suggested Becker. “Roth's got to be trained not to give in to threats of violence. But what if we threaten to kill her?”

  “If you threaten to do something, you'd better be prepared to do it,” said Jaimie seriously. “This guy deals with threats every day. If he sees that you've lied to him once, he won't believe anything else you say.”

  “Well, she's still a possibility. Keep going through his file and see if there's anything better we can use.”

  She continued calling up information.

  “He's a diabetic,” she announced a moment later. “Takes insulin shots twice a day.”

  “Well, that's something,” said Becker. “If we get there while he's gone, we can find his insulin and withhold it.”

  “And turn him into a semi-comatose zombie who won't remember or feel obligated to honor anything he says to us?”

  “Well, damn it, what would you do?” snapped Becker.

  “I don't know. I don't think we've found the answer yet.”

  “Then keep looking. I want to confront him tomorrow. Every hour we wait is an extra hour for them to figure out where we are.”

  “As far as you're concerned, they think you're in Washington,” she assured him. “The first thing I did when I activated my computer was send a signal to the machine we left back in Washington. Right about now everyone connected with this business knows you've in D.C., making clumsy attempts to tie into your computer's memory banks and private files.”

  He made no reply, but instead started pacing from one room to the next, trying to figure out exactly what he would do if he actually made it to Roth's apartment, and realizing that there wasn't a lot in his legal or even military background to draw upon.

  “Take it easy, Counselor,” said Jaimie. “You're making me nervous.”

  “That makes two of us.”

  “Relax. I've got all night to find something. If it's there, I'll have it before we need it.”

  “I know,” he said. “I suppose the problem is that I'm getting so used to running that waiting is getting harder and harder.”

  “Depending on what kind of alarm system he's got, you may not get a chance to confront him anyway. We've still got a lot of work ahead of us.”

  “You said my scheme would work.”

  “Oh, it'll probably get us up to the 115th floor,” she responded. “But what are you going to do once you get there? Knock on the door and hope he opens it? Kick it in and hope he doesn't have a private alarm system? Pick the lock with all the skills you acquired in your course on torts?”

  “I haven't thought about it,” he admitted.

  “Why don't you spend a little time thinking about it while I keep trying to dig up more data on Roth?” she suggested.

  “It would just be a waste of time,” he said. “I can't come up with anything until I know how the 115th floor is laid out.”

  “That's easy enough,” she said, walking over to her other computer and activating it. She typed a few brief commands on the keyboard, waited for a coded response, and then typed some more.

  “What are you doing?” he asked.

  “Telling the realtor in charge of the building that I want to buy an apartment between the 100th and 120th floors. He's responded that there aren't any available at the moment, and I told him to run a credit check through my Swiss account to confirm that I could afford it, and then to transmit a floor plan to me. If I like it, I'll go on the waiting list.”

  “You didn't use your real name?”

  “Of course not!”

  “Then how can he check your bank account?”

  “The Swiss don't use names; they use numbers.”

  “So that's what he's doing now?” asked Becker. “Checking your Swiss account?”

  “Checking one of them. As soon as he's through, I'll transfer the funds and close out the account so that knowing the number won't do him any good.” The holographic screen suddenly came to glowing life. “Ah! Here it comes.”

  It was a three-dimensional floor plan of the 103rd floor, with a notation that all the floors within her range had identical floor plans.

  “Two apartments,” she mused, ordering her machine to keep displaying the plans while simultaneously storing them it its memory for future use. “Still, they're mirror-images, so it really won't matter which one is Roth's. If you can find a method that works for one, it'll work for the other.”

  “How will we know which one is Roth's when we get there?” asked Becker.

  “He's not in hiding, Counselor,” she explained patiently. “His apartment number will be listed in the Building Directory.”

  “I'm sorry if I'm asking stupid questions,” said Becker. “But I'm new at this.”

  “I've never broken into the Diamond Tower either,” she responded. “But I do know how to use the brains God gave me.”

  She walked back to her original computer without another word, and Becker stood, hands on hips, examining the floor plan, looking for weaknesses.

  The elevator let the residents off in a circular marble foyer, perhaps forty feet in diameter, filled with plaster duplicates of famous statues. There were two doors, almost equidistant along the foyer's circumference between the residential elevator and the doors to the two apartments: the one to the north was the service elevator, the one to the south led to the stairwell. Both apartment doors had computer locks that were tied in
to the main security desk on the 55th floor; it would register every time one of them opened or closed.

  He studied the apartments. Each had a living room that was closer in size to a ballroom, with a window wall overlooking the city. The master bedrooms had his-and-her bathrooms, and there were three other bedrooms, each with its own bath. There were studies and libraries, dining rooms and breakfast rooms, gymnasiums and kitchens, and a terrace possessing a hot tub. A myriad of places to hide an alarm switch coded to voiceprint, palm print, or retinagram: by the time he could find the switch and figure out how to turn it off, the entire New York metropolitan police force would be on the premises.

  He examined the exterior of the apartments. The walls were steel and glass, too smooth and sleek for so much as a handhold—and besides, he still didn't completely believe Jaimie's hint that she had once been a cat burglar. No, the answer had to be in the interior somewhere, and he went back to studying the floor plan.

  Well, if there was no way to pinpoint any personal alarm system, they would have to bypass the alarm. How? By accosting Roth outside the apartment. Look and act desperate enough and he'd deactivate the system for them. He might not do it for a man he was trying to kill for his country, but he'd do it rather than get blown away uselessly by a pair of hopheads out for some quick money. After they were safely inside the apartment and the alarms were deactivated, there would be plenty of time to tell him who they were.

  So, since the elevator was out and breaking into the apartment was out, the problem was how to confront him in the foyer of the 115th floor.

  They couldn't wait in the stairwell; if it boiled down to a race, he'd beat them to the door, or simply step back into the elevator. Nor could they use the service elevator; they didn't know what security devices it possessed, and it was every bit as far from Roth's door as the stairwell.

  So they would have to be in the foyer when he arrived.

  All right, thought Roth; what possible reason can two people have for being there?

  Fixing locks? No, he'd have his own locksmith for his own security system.

  Painters? No, the foyer was all marble and false gems.

  And then he looked at the statues again. There was a replica of Michelangelo's David, as well as Rodin's The Thinker and a trio of others that he didn't recognize.

  Becker continued staring at them for a long moment—and suddenly he knew how they were going to get in.

  Satisfied, he walked over to where Jaimie was working.

  “How's it coming?” he asked.

  “Slowly,” she replied. “This is some guy, this Roth. If he's got a weak spot in his armor, I haven't been able to find it yet. Probably the best thing we have going for us is that he seems like a normal, healthy, well-adjusted human being.”

  “I don't follow you.”

  “I mean that he doesn't seem like the kind of guy who'll throw away his life for no reason at all, so he'll probably pass the buck along rather than let you kill him.”

  “Pass the buck where?”

  “Who knows?” she said. “But he doesn't create assassination orders; he just carries them out. If we're lucky, he'll tell you who originated the order. That's the man you want.”

  “The first man I want is the man who can call the killers off,” said Becker. “Then we'll get back to worrying about why they want to kill me in the first place.”

  “Well, just remember not to get too close to this guy. He may not be any spring chicken, but he's got three decorations for bravery above and beyond the call, and he used to be the best killer the army ever had, before he moved over to the space service. They even wrote a book about his commando work in the Guays.”

  “The Guays?”

  “Uruguay and Paraguay.”

  “I'll remember.”

  “How's your work coming?” she asked. “Have you found a way in?”

  “I think so.”

  “You think so?” she repeated dubiously.

  “With a building like this, I don't think you can know until you've tried it.” He paused. “But if your literary allusion was correct, it ought to work.”

  “What literary allusion?”

  “Sherlock Holmes. Every other approach was impossible, so if the building's security can be breached, I've found the only way to do it.”

  “Do you want to tell me about it, or are you just gonna surprise me?”

  He sat down and explained his idea to her.

  “It just might work,” she agreed when he had finished. “And besides, we don't have any choice. You were dead right about all the other methods: they're impossible.”

  “I'm glad you agree,” said Becker, getting to his feet and walking to the doorway between their rooms. “Now let's get some sleep. We've got a big day ahead of us tomorrow.”

  “Right,” she said. “Let's just hope that we're still alive at the end of it.”

  16.

  They were up and dressed by six o'clock, and by eight-thirty they had managed to obtain the materials that they needed. Then, dressed like affluent tourists, they walked over to the Diamond Tower with their possessions in a shopping bag from one of the more expensive women's clothing stores that Becker had rescued from the Regal's trash bin.

  They immediately walked over to the elevator complex and began studying the charts.

  “Can we get there from the 55th?” he asked.

  “I'm looking.”

  “Wait a minute,” he said. “Here it is. Elevator 42: it's express to the 45th floor, local to the 55th, and express again to the 140th.”

  “All right,” said Jaimie. “Let's check and see what's on the 55th.” She went back to the building's commercial directory, while Becker busied himself finding out the exact number of Roth's apartment. They met back at the elevators a moment later.

  “It should be okay,” she said. “There are six offices on the 55th, so there won't be too much traffic, but there's also a jeweler and an antiquarian book dealer, so we have some excuse to be seen up there.”

  “Good,” said Becker. “Roth's apartment is 11502.”

  “That should be to the right of the elevator door,” she replied.

  “All right,” said Becker. “We might as well get going, just in case he comes home for lunch.”

  “I doubt that he will. He's much more likely to eat out.”

  “Then that gives us seven or eight hours to get ready for him.”

  “Or his wife, or his servants, or his housepainter, or...”

  “Don't confuse the issue,” said Becker. “If you want out, just say so.”

  “I'm not confusing the issue. I'm just pointing out that he's not necessarily gonna be the first guy along.”

  “Then we'll play it by ear. Got your gun?”

  “That's the third time you've asked me since we left the Regal.”

  He made no reply, but instead pressed a button that summoned Elevator 42.

  “We might draw less attention if we take one of the local ones,” she said.

  He shook his head. “I'd rather know for sure that this one is waiting for me. The locals don't go to the 140th floor, and that's where we've got to be when the alarm goes off.”

  She shrugged. “Whatever you say.”

  “That's what I say.”

  The elevator finally arrived, and a moment later they found themselves alone in it as they ascended to the 55th floor.

  “All right,” he said, clutching the bag firmly in his right hand. “You stay here and keep the door open.”

  “What if someone comes along and wants it?”

  “Just tell them your husband is paying the jeweler, and that he'll be along in just a few seconds.”

  “And if the party who wants the elevator has come from the jeweler?”

  “Then tell him I'm paying the bookseller!” he snapped.

  “The elevator can't take six minutes to make its entire run,” she said. “We'd be much less visible if I don't hold it for you. I can get off with you, and we can summon it a c
ouple of minutes later.”

  “I'm no expert,” he said. “I think I'm setting the damned thing for twenty minutes, but what if it's five?”

  “You're just being nervous. If you set it to go off in twenty minutes, it'll take twenty minutes.”

  He stared at her as the elevator began slowing down. “You're sure you'd rather get off and summon it again?”

  “Yes.”

  “How about a compromise? Wait here for me until someone summons it. If no one does, I'll be back in less than three minutes.”

  She shook her head. “Won't work. If you hold up the elevator while it's being summoned, an alarm goes off after about thirty seconds.” She stared at him. “You want everyone on this floor to know something fishy is going on and to remember your face? Make a mad dash down the corridor to catch the elevator when the alarm goes off.”

  “All right,” he said. “You win.”

  “Good,” she replied, stepping out of the elevator as it came to a stop and the doors slid open.

  He followed her, then paused for a moment to get his bearings while the elevator door closed behind him—and headed off toward the stairwell.

  They passed the antiquarian book dealer. Then, when they reached the jewelry store, she stopped.

  “I'll just pop in here while you hunt for your book,” she said in a loud enough voice to be overheard by the saleswoman behind the counter.

  Surprised, he watched her enter the store, then realized that she was talking and directing the saleswoman's attention to the back of the shop, so that she wouldn't see which direction he went, and he immediately walked to the stairwell. There were a pair of restrooms right across the corridor from it, and he entered the men's room and began assembling the tiny device he had bought at the army surplus shop earlier that morning. It was no larger than a pencil, but if Jaimie was right about where the thermostat was, it would be enough—and it had the added advantage, once it was discovered, of deceiving the police into thinking they were still on the 55th floor.

  When he was through rigging it, he activated the tiny device, took it across the corridor, and taped it to the computer lock. When it went off in twenty minutes, it would produce almost eight hundred degrees of heat for about three seconds, before burning itself out. This would serve the double purpose of setting off the alarm that unlocked all the fire doors, and fusing this particular door shut, so that anyone looking for two thieves or vandals would assume they were trapped somewhere on the 55th floor.